Have you ever wondered how companies determine the price of their products or services? 

It’s a crucial decision that can make or break a business. But without solid data on what consumers are willing to pay, choosing a price point for any product is just a shot in the dark. 

That’s where the Gabor-Granger pricing methodology comes into play. 

Today, we'll explore the ins and outs of the Gabor-Granger methodology and how to use it in your market research to find the optimal price point for your offering. 

 

What is Gabor-Granger? 

Gabor-Granger is a pricing methodology used in market research to examine the relationship between price and demand for products and services. While it will ultimately help you find the optimal price point, it will also show you the effect that raising or lowering your price will have on your product’s demand. 

It does this by giving respondents a series of nearly identical questions, the base of which being: “Would you buy [PRODUCT] for $[PRICE]?” 

Once the first question is posed to respondents, the subsequent questions are adapted to their answers. Presenting respondents with higher prices, until they indicate a lack of purchase intent. Ultimately, these questions are designed to determine the highest price a consumer is willing to pay. 

Based on the responses, a demand curve is generated, showing the relationship between price and demand and highlighting an optimal price point that maximizes revenue. 

While there are many pricing methodologies to choose from, we would suggest choosing Gabor Granger if: 

You have an established price range but need to pinpoint an exact price. (If you need to establish a price range, we'd suggest using a Van Westendorp.) 
You want to understand the price sensitivity surrounding your product or category. 
You need to understand the role price will play in the demand for your product. 

 

Gabor-Granger with SightX

With SightX, finding the price point that maximizes your revenue is simple. 

After creating a new project, you’ll start in the BUILD section. There you can select “Gabor-Granger Pricing” from the add item menu. 

The experiment will immediately populate, giving you space to add a description and image of your product or service. You can also set a currency and minimum and maximum prices if you have them. 

Below that, you’ll find the experiment. The first question you’ll see is an optional purchase intent screener. This question allows you to disqualify respondents who have no intent to purchase your product. While optional, we would suggest leaving this toggled.  From there, you’ll see the price questions, where you can edit the intervals and labels. 

Once your data is collected, you'll see something similar to the graph below. The purple line shows your demand curve, while the yellow line shows your expected revenue. To the right of the graph, you'll see your revenue maximizing price displayed. 

You can also add your expected number of customers to estimate your maximum revenue, and change the prices you’d like to test to determine if a price is elastic or inelastic.

 

Optimize Your Pricing Strategy with SightX

If you’re ready to level up your insights, we’ve got the tools to make it happen! 

The SightX platform is the next generation of market research tools: a single unified solution for consumer engagement, understanding, advanced analysis, and reporting.

But, SightX isn’t just great tech. Our Research Services team knows all of the best practices, along with some tips and tricks for getting the best data out of your surveys and experiments.

Remove the guesswork from your strategy by going directly to the source. Get started today!

Agile market research is synonymous with flexibility, collaboration, and iterative learning. 

In today's market, where brands need to make decisions quickly to get (and stay) ahead, traditional market research methods just aren't cutting it anymore. 

Enter the agile research movement. 

Today, we'll explore how an agile market research approach can quickly deliver deep and actionable insights through a flexible and iterative process. 

 

What is Agile Market Research? 

Agile market research emphasizes flexibility, collaboration, and rapid iteration to deliver quality insights quickly. Allowing you to test different ideas before making critical decisions on your products, marketing, design, or service. 

How does it work? 

Agile market research involves conducting research in short, iterative cycles, or 'sprints', using technology (like AI and/or machine learning) to automate time-consuming processes.

Once a study is complete, the insights are used to inform the next round of testing. But it's not just the data that gets picked apart- teams will often use the end of each sprint to look back at the process and remove roadblocks to improve efficiency. 

The result? 

When done right, an agile methodology will help you explore, test, iterate, and refine ideas quickly, gaining the insights you need to make critical business decisions faster. 

 

Why Should I Use an Agile Market Research Approach? 

Not only is agile market research considerably faster than traditional methods, but it also affords you much more flexibility. 

By conducting your research in short cycles- instead of large one-off studies- you can quickly act on learnings and avoid wasting time and resources on low-potential ideas. 

An agile approach can also free up the budget for research and insights departments. Bringing your insights in-house and using tech to automate the heavy lifting allows you to screen ideas quickly with smaller audiences without committing significant resources to any one project. 

 

 

How Can I Use Agile Market Research? 

Test Your Product Ideas- Conduct small-scale tests with target markets to rapidly iterate on your product design and quickly identify the elements that work. 

Keep a Pulse on Customer Satisfaction- Use surveys, online reviews, and other feedback mechanisms, to seamlessly gather and analyze customer satisfaction data to improve your processes in real time. 

Perfect Your Marketing- Test  your marketing collateral with small-scale audiences to swiftly identify which messages, graphics, and channels are most effective. 

Identify Emerging Trends- Use consumer sentiment data from brand tracking and customer satisfaction studies to stay ahead of the trends in your space. 

Optimize Your Pricing Strategy- Test different pricing strategies with small groups of customers to quickly identify the most effective pricing model for your products or services.

 

Agile Market Research with SightX

The SightX platform is the only tool you'll ever need for agile market research: a single, unified solution for consumer engagement, data collection, advanced analysis, and reporting. While powerful enough for insights teams at Fortune 500 companies, the user-friendly interface makes it simple for anyone to start, optimize, and scale their research. 

Plus, with SightX's research team, you can gain access to the best thinking in the insights field. Our in-house experts will guide you through every step in the market research process, from survey scripting to analysis support, and everything in-between. 

If you're ready to get started with agile market research, sign up today!

 

Pricing is a crucial factor that often determines the success (or failure) of an offering. But without solid data on what consumers are willing to pay, businesses are left with best guesses and gut feelings. 

That's why many organizations turn to market research methodologies like Van Westendorp's Price Sensitivity Meter to create a pricing model driven by customer data. Here's how it works: 

 

What is Van Westendorp? 

Since its introduction in the 1970s, the Van Westendorp Price Sensitivity Meter has been a popular pricing methodology used in market research. 

Instead of simply asking consumers to identify a dollar amount, this experiment evaluates a range of acceptable prices for your product and offers an optimal price point. It does this by asking four key questions: 

"At what price would you begin to consider the product so inexpensive that you would question the quality and not purchase it? " 
"At what point would you think the product is a bargain?" 
"At what price would you say this product is starting to become expensive- to the point that you’d have to give some thought to buying it? "
"At what price point would you consider the product to be so expensive that you wouldn’t consider buying it?"

While the questions themselves are quite simple, the output is powerful. 

After running a study, the visualization will reveal an acceptable range of prices (highlighted in green in the visualization below). 

This range of prices is end-capped by the point of marginal cheapness (PMC) on the left and the point of marginal expensiveness (PME) on the right. If you price your offering any lower than the PMC, shoppers would likely find your product too cheap and question the quality. Similarly, any price above the PME would be considered too expensive for most of your market. 

But that’s not all it will show you. 

Directly in the center, you will see the intersection of the “too cheap” and “too expensive” lines. This is your optimal price point. 

What makes it optimal? It minimizes the number of people who are dissatisfied with your price one way or the other. 

While there are many pricing methodologies to choose from, we would recommend using a Van Westendorp for your pricing if:

You don’t have a price range for your offering and would like to explore your options. 
You would prefer to run a simpler study that will yield straightforward results. 

 

If you already have a price range, but are looking to find your optimal price point- check out our blog on Gabor-Granger. 

 

Van Westendorp with SightX

With SightX, gauging price sensitivity and solidifying an optimal pricing strategy is simple. 

After creating a new project, you’ll start in the BUILD section. There you can select “Van Westendorp Pricing” from the add item menu.

The experiment will immediately populate, giving you space to add a description and image of your product or service. You can also set a currency and minimum and maximum prices if you have them. 

Below, you’ll find the study. The first question we suggest is a purchase intent screener. This question allows you to disqualify respondents who have little or no intent to purchase your product. 

From there, the four  Van Westendorp questions are pre-filled and set for launch. You’ll just want to include a welcome page and some demographic questions. 

After you’ve fielded your survey and gotten the results,  you'll see something like the graph below. The green box in the center of the graph highlights the range of acceptable prices. 

On the left, you'll see a red dot that indicates the point of marginal cheapness (PMC). On the right, you'll see a green dot indicating the point of marginal expensiveness. And directly in the center of highlighted area is your optimal price- also displayed to the right of the graph. 

Evaluate Price Sensitivity with SightX

If you’re ready to level up your insights, we’ve got the tools to make it happen! 

The SightX platform is the next generation of market research tools: a single unified solution for consumer engagement, understanding, advanced analysis, and reporting.

But, SightX isn’t just great tech. Our Research Services team knows all of the best practices, along with some tips and tricks for getting the best data out of your surveys and experiments.

Remove the guesswork from your strategy by going directly to the source. Get started for free!

 

If we've learned anything in the last decade, it's that the market is unpredictable and always subject to change. 

When faced with economic turbulence, we know that consumers will be tightening their purse strings. But this leaves many companies wondering how to adapt their strategies to survive or perhaps even thrive. 

Often, the knee-jerk reaction is to pull back.

Unfortunately, market research and consumer insights departments often feel the brunt of the subsequent cutbacks. Forcing them to trudge forward with lower budgets, understaffed teams, and a "do more, with less" attitude. 

Under normal circumstances, market research is crucial for understanding customers, competitors, and market trends. But during an economic downturn, it becomes even more essential. 

By taking the time to truly understand the changing needs of the market and the opportunities on the horizon, organizations can thrive, even under poor market conditions. Here's how: 

 

1. Identify shifts in consumer behavior: During an economic downturn, consumer behavior can change rapidly and without notice. With new economic stressors come new priorities and buying habits. Market research can help businesses understand how their customers are responding to the economic climate and what they can do to better serve them. This makes it an ideal time to dig into shifts in purchase behavior, preferences, and attitudes through targeted surveys. 

2. Re-Evaluate your offerings: While it might seem counterintuitive, an economic downturn is a great time to re-evaluate products and services. Does the offering still meet the market's needs? What are consumers' priorities when shopping in a given category? What elements of a product or service matter most to consumers now, and why? Using a mix of traditional surveys, conjoint analysis, and/or maxdiff analysis can allow organizations to re-work their offerings to better fit changing expectations. However, before making any seismic shifts, run the ideas by core customers with concept tests to confirm the findings. 

3. Assess your competition: In turbulent economic conditions, competition can become even more fierce as businesses fight for a slice of shrinking consumer spending. Insights from market research can reveal a competitor's strengths and weaknesses, and even illuminate how they are adapting to changing conditions. This information can not only help businesses strategize, but it can also show you potential gaps and opportunities to capture additional market share. 

4. Build a healthier brand: Brand building isn't just a startup activity. Having a healthy, relevant, and memorable brand can improve customer loyalty and retention- both of which are crucial during economic uncertainty. Brand trackers are one of the easiest ways to get timely feedback on how key indicators like awareness, usage, consideration, and loyalty may have changed due to market events.  

5. Evaluate your pricing and promotions: It's a fact that in an economic downturn, consumers become more price-sensitive. Because of this, businesses that re-visit their pricing and promotional strategies have the upper hand. Running price sensitivity and optimization studies (like Van Westendorp or Gabor Granger) can give you a price point that maximizes your revenue without compromising demand. 

6. Explore new markets: If a business wants to maintain (or grow) its revenue streams during a downturn, exploring new opportunities through market research is key. This is a great time for organizations to branch out and survey consumers outside of their traditional market segments. The insights gained can help to guide new product and marketing strategies for the new audiences identified. 

7. Monitor trends: Economic downturns can be unpredictable, and market trends can change rapidly. Market research can help businesses stay up-to-date on the latest trends and adjust their strategies accordingly. Perfecting products and messaging in a downturn requires staying on top of shifting behaviors and attitudes. 

 

Market Research with SightX

The SightX platform is the only tool you'll ever need for market research: a single, unified solution for consumer engagement, data collection, advanced analysis, and reporting. While powerful enough for insights teams at Fortune 500 companies, the user-friendly interface makes it simple for anyone to start, optimize, and scale their research. 

Plus, with SightX's research team, you can gain access to the best thinking in the insights field. Our in-house experts will guide you through every step in the market research process, from survey scripting to analysis support, and everything in-between. 

If you're ready to get started with iterative market research, get started today!

Building and maintaining a healthy brand is easier said than done. 

Today, consumers expect much more from the brands they engage with. Often seeking out those that not only provide the best offerings but that also align with their values, commit to causes, and entertain them on the internet. 

Which has made staying relevant more difficult than ever before. 

That’s precisely why organizations turn to brand tracking to understand what consumers are looking for and how to better meet their expectations. 

 

Why Brand Tracking is Essential

Brand KPIs like awareness, perception, or preference can often feel ambiguous. But that doesn’t make them impossible to quantify. 

Brand tracking aims to take these seemingly intangible metrics and make them a measurable part of your reporting. Ultimately, the data will help you make better decisions about your marketing and branding strategy. 

By tracking your brand's performance over time, you can evaluate the impact new product launches and marketing campaigns have on consumers. Allowing you to more easily demonstrate campaign ROI and proactively correct underperformance. 

Overall, brand tracking will give you insights into how your brand performs across segments, how you stack up against competitors, and what market needs are going left unmet. 

 

11 Questions to Add to Your Next Brand Tracker

While this is by no means a complete template, we've put together a list of not-so-frequently asked questions to help you get better insights from your brand tracker: 

 

1. When considering [Industry] products, which brands come to mind? 

Starting your brand tracker with an unaided recall question (aka open-response) will help you immediately pick out the stickiest brands in your category. 

The data will show you who stands out best in the crowd and may even illuminate new competitors you weren't previously aware of. 

 

2. Which brands, if any, do you consider when shopping for [Products]? 

For this question, you’ll want to include your brand alongside your core competitors in the answer options. These results will give you a clear picture of where you stand when consumers make purchasing decisions. 

 

3. Please rank the following brands in the [Category] category. 

Once respondents have selected brands they recognize, consider, or purchase, it can be interesting to see how they perceive each brand in relation to others. 

While you may think you have a good idea of how these rankings will shake out, you might be surprised to learn what brands consumers actually prefer. 

 

4. Which of the following best describes you? 

Here, you will want to populate your answer options with something like: 

I have favorite brands and prefer to purchase their products whenever I can.

">">">">I have favorite brands, but I'm open to exploring others that interest me. 

The brand isn’t important to me. I shop for what best suits my needs and budget at the time. 

This will give you a sense of how loyal consumers feel to specific brands in your category and how difficult (or easy) it might be to win them over. 

It will also give you insights into the types of shoppers in your target market. Do they generally stick to their favorite brands? Or are they willing to purchase any brand that fits their price point? 

 

5. How did you discover [Brand]?

It can be incredibly helpful to learn how people find you. Whether they came across your offerings organically or engaged with your marketing materials, it's crucial to understand which touchpoints drive awareness. 

 

6. What was your first reaction to [Brand]?

You can approach this question in a couple of different ways. If you want to know the sentiments surrounding your brand, an open-response question would work well. 

On the other hand, you can also use a multi-select question type pre-filled with both positive and negative adjectives for a solely quantitative approach. 

No matter which you choose, the data will tell you what consumers see as your greatest selling points. Maybe they loved your fun, brightly colored marketing. Or, perhaps your product wowed them with its quality. 

No matter the reason, it will give you some clues on where to double down. 

 

7. How can [Brand] do better? 

There is always room for improvement. Depending on your category and products, you may want to include answer options like “Quality”, “Involvement in Social Causes”, or “Packaging”. And as always, we would suggest adding “none of the above” and “other-please specify” options to gather the full spectrum of possible answers. 

Ultimately this data will help you with customer retention, product optimization, and even messaging refinement. 

 

8. Why do you buy products from [Brand]?

For this question, we would suggest a multi-select question with answer options like price, availability, or quality. 

The results will let you know what problems you are really solving for your customers and the reasons they choose your brand. 

 

9. What words come to mind when you think about [Brand]?

Here, you will want to include a mix of positive and negative adjectives that consumers may associate with your brand. 

Understanding these associations will go a long way towards understanding the sentiments surrounding your organization, and whether the associations that surround you are mainly positive or negative. 

 

10. Based on what you know about [Brand], how would you say it compares to other brands in the [Category] category? 

This question will give you insights into how you (and your competitors) are positioned in your category. With this data you can refine your marketing, branding, and even product efforts to better stand out in the crowd. 

 

11. What are your biggest pain points with the current [Category] offerings on the market? 

While there may be many solutions in your category, that doesn't necessarily mean all of your customer's pain points are being ameliorated. The results will show you what market opportunities may be available and how your brand can position itself as an innovative category leader.  

 

Brand Tracking with SightX

The SightX platform is the next generation of consumer insights tools: a single, unified solution for consumer engagement, understanding, advanced analysis, and reporting. While it's powerful enough for insights teams at leading companies, its user-friendly interface makes it easy for anyone to start, optimize, and scale their research. 

Plus, with SightX's research support team, you can gain access to the best thinking in the insights field. Our team of in-house experts will guide you through every step in the market research process, from survey scripting to analysis support, and everything in-between. 

If you're ready to remove the guesswork from your decision-making, start a free trial today.

In its traditional form, market research takes time. It takes time to build studies. It takes time to collect responses. And it takes time to thoroughly analyze the results. 

But even though research is a driving force for intelligent decision-making, we don't always have time. 

This challenge has given rise to an iterative approach. 

For those unfamiliar with the term, iterative market research is a circular process. One that uses data from a study to inform the questions and goals of the next. This approach balances the need for speed and agility with the need for deep and relevant insights. 

Instead of trying to run a single study packed tightly with objectives, you run multiple, smaller surveys. Each providing the insights that guide your next project. 

When done right, iterative market research enables you to act on insights quickly and make more impactful decisions. But the key is moving fast; without sacrificing quality. 

As iterative market research continues to gain popularity, we’re sharing some of our tips to help you get started. 

 

1. Begin with the end in mind. 

Much like any research study, you need to lay out your goals and objectives at the start.

Here it can be helpful to work backward, thinking about the insights you need and the story you want to tell. 

Gather the stakeholders involved and ask yourself some questions like; how exactly will we use this data once we have it? What metrics matter most? And what decisions will be informed by our findings?

By laying out the goals for each study, it will be easier to write effective questions and design experiments that produce actionable insights. 

 

2. Try flexible templates.

If you're looking for a way to reduce the build time for your surveys and experiments, templates can be a great option!

Not only will a good template make your workflow more efficient, but you may also discover some questions and techniques you hadn't previously considered. 

But when looking for templates, you’ll want to keep an eye out for two factors: level of detail and flexibility. 

It’s important to find a survey template that includes the questions and experiments you need while still having the flexibility to add, remove, re-order, and edit where necessary. Check out the links below for a few of our most popular templates: 

 Brand Awareness Survey Template

 Logo Testing Survey Template

 Messaging & Claims Testing Template

 Competitor Analysis Template

 Ad Testing Template

 

3. Lean on automation.

While templates can save you time on the front end, automation can do the heavy lifting on the back end. 

Automated analysis functionalities allow you to ditch tedious manual tasks like data cleaning, organizing, exporting, and reporting. Not only does this cut down on your overall time-to-insights, but it also gives you time back for mission-critical objectives, like digging into your data and finding ways to use insights to better your organization.   

 

4. Report on the insights that matter most. 

In iterative market research, the key findings from each study are directly applied to the next round of experimentation. So when you look at your data, you'll need to distill your findings into key learnings. The simpler, the better. 

Sure, it may be interesting that females under 30 were the most likely to prefer your indigo packaging concept. But is that insight really going to help inform your next study? Probably not. 

Dig deep into your data, but keep focused on the metrics and outcomes that will have a direct impact. 

 

Iterative Market Research with SightX

The SightX platform is the only tool you'll ever need for iterative market research: a single, unified solution for consumer engagement, data collection, advanced analysis, and reporting. While powerful enough for insights teams at Fortune 500 companies, the user-friendly interface makes it simple for anyone to start, optimize, and scale their research. 

Plus, with SightX's research team, you can gain access to the best thinking in the insights field. Our in-house experts will guide you through every step in the market research process, from survey scripting to analysis support, and everything in-between. 

If you're ready to get started with iterative market research, get started today!

 

 

If you want the best data from your surveys, you have to know how to write effective questions. 

While simple enough in theory, developing relevant survey questions takes some intention and a bit of practice. But that doesn't mean it has to be complicated. 

Today, we’ll share some simple yet powerful tips from our in-house research team to help elevate your next survey. 

What is a “Good” Survey Question? 

Before we go any further, let's take a step back and investigate what a "good" survey question really is. 

Definitionally, a good survey question is: 

 Clear and direct in meaning. 

 Considerate of user experience. 

 Free from bias. 

 Focused on achieving the goal of the survey. 

 

If that sounds incredibly simple, you’re not wrong! But, it does require some forethought. 

By focusing your energy on writing clear, unbiased questions that point back toward your objective, you can set yourself up for high-quality insights. 

 

How to Write Better Survey Questions

Here are some guidelines to consider when drafting your next survey: 

Do Begin with an End in Mind

Before you even begin a rough draft, you need to know the purpose of your project, the objectives you want to achieve, and the topics you'll need to cover. 

A great way to do this is by asking yourself (or your team) some basic questions, like; how will this data be used? What metrics matter most to us? And what decisions will be made based on the insights we've found?

Nailing down these details early on will ensure your questions are relevant and the feedback you collect is reliable. 

 

Do Use Simple and Direct Language

Unless your sample is highly targeted at a specific group (think Ph.D. students or IT decision-makers) you need to keep your language simple and free of jargon, undefined acronyms, or buzzwords. 

A general best practice is to write questions at your audience's level of understanding. So, if the sample for your survey is the general public, you’d want to write for a 6th-grade level of comprehension. That means keeping your vocabulary and sentence structure simple and straightforward. 

 

Do Keep Your Survey Short

We know, we know- this one is much easier said than done. But research has shown that long, monotonous surveys only lead to respondent fatigue and poor-quality data. 

Because surveys are highly personalized to the use case they serve, it's impossible to give a precise question limit. 

Instead, we like to think about it in terms of time. Try to keep your surveys no more than 7-10 minutes long to avoid respondent fatigue. 

And if your survey has to be longer, consider providing a good incentive- they can be especially useful in these situations!

 

Do Add Screening Questions Upfront

If you have any screening questions that may terminate or disqualify a respondent, you’ll want to ask them early in your survey. 

For example, let's say you're targeting consumers who have used products from your competitors. You would need to include a question at or near the start of your survey asking which products respondents have tried. 

This ensures that no one's time is wasted, and ensures you can more quickly fill your survey with qualified respondents. 

 

Do Provide Alternative Answer Options

It's impossible to list every potential answer to a question. 

That's why you should always provide alternative answer options for multiple choice questions, like; "none of the above" and "other- please specify." 

Including these additional options gives respondents an out in situations where they would otherwise be compelled to select a choice that didn’t reflect their feelings. 

 

Do Vary Your Question Types

Multiple-choice questions aren’t the only (or best) way to collect feedback!

Adding rank order, matrix, rating scale, and even heatmap questions can make your survey more engaging and provide interesting insights. A win-win for everyone. 

Plus, rating scale/slider questions work seamlessly with SightX’s automated persona tool- which uses Machine Learning to uncover buyer personas you might be missing. If you’re interested in this topic- check out the blog Consumer Segmentation: Maybe You Could Be Doing it Better. 

 

Do Limit the Number of Open-Ended Questions Your Include

Text analysis can give you some honest and intriguing insights. However, open-response questions come with drawbacks. 

Specifically- the toll they take on respondents. 

Not only do people get tired of typing out long answers, but this question type can often carry a heavier mental load than simply selecting, rating, or ranking answer options. 

So, use open-ended questions strategically and only when needed. 

 

Do Keep Your Scales Balanced and Consistent 

We’ve said it before, and we’ll probably say it again: do NOT use even-numbered scales. Instead, stick to a 3, 5, or 7-point scale. 

Why? Because even-numbered scales do not leave room for a neutral option. And without a neutral option, truly neutral respondents can be forced to select a rating that doesn't reflect their feelings. 

You also need to make sure your scales are consistent.

 If the first scale question you ask begins at “Very Negative” and ends with “Very Positive” you will want to keep this structure throughout your entire survey. 

 

Do Consider Adding an Attention Checker

Sometimes people’s attention can stray from the task at hand. Unfortunately, that isn’t ideal if you're looking for high-quality survey data. 

To combat this, add a simple attention-checking question in the middle of your survey. They can look something like the example below: 

 

 

Short surveys will only need one. But, if your survey is on the longer side you may consider adding multiple. 

 

Do Test Your Survey

This one might seem simple, but we’ve included it for a reason. 

Before you send your survey off to thousands of people, give it a try yourself. You may catch spelling, grammar, or survey flow issues you would have otherwise missed. So never overlook the power of a good test. 

 

What to Avoid to Write Better Survey Questions

Now, for the other side of the coin. 

Don't Write Leading Questions

Leading questions steer respondents in a specific direction with an implication that there is a correct answer. 

For example, if you wanted to get some metrics on your customer satisfaction you might include a question like “How satisfied are you with our product?” 

However, this phrasing assumes the customer was satisfied. 

Instead, you might want to rephrase the question to: “Please rate your experience below, with 1 being “not at all satisfied” and 5 being “very satisfied." 

 

Don't Ask Double-Barreled Questions

When writing your survey questions, the word “and” isn’t your friend. 

For the most reliable data, you want to only ask about one metric at a time. 

For example, if you were to ask a respondent “How would you rate the performance and value of our product?” you’d be putting them in a tricky situation. Maybe they found the performance stellar but felt differently about the value. 

Instead, you would want to separate the performance and value metrics into two questions to properly evaluate each. 

 

Don't Place Demographic Questions in the Middle of a Survey

If you’re using any demographic questions as screeners, you’ll need to include those upfront. However, the rest you can split between the beginning and end of your survey. That way you can still collect the data you need without requesting too much personal information up-front. 

 

Surveys with SightX

The SightX platform is the next generation of market research tools: a single, unified solution for consumer engagement, understanding, advanced analysis, and reporting. It allows insights, marketing, and CX teams to start, optimize, and scale their insights workflow.

But, SightX isn’t just great tech. Our Research Services team knows all of the best practices, along with some tips and tricks for getting the best data out of your surveys.

Remove the guesswork from your current strategy by going directly to the source. Start a free trial today!

It can be tempting to try and give your customers every single product, feature, or service they ask for. But no matter how ambitious your brand is, the fact remains; you can’t do it all. 

In fact, trying to fulfill every whim will only end up straining your time, capital, and energy. Instead, you have to strike a delicate balance of providing just enough variety without overextending your resources. 

That’s exactly why many companies turn to TURF analysis to help them carefully choose the right combination of products, features, or messaging to maximize their reach. 

Sound interesting?

Keep reading to learn how to you can use TURF analysis in your own consumer research to expand your appeal within your target market. 

 

What is TURF Analysis?

TURF stands for Total Unduplicated Reach and Frequency. 

It's a statistical methodology used in consumer research to find an optimal mix of offerings (like products, features, or message points) that appeal to the maximum number of people in the most efficient and cost-effective way.

If that sounds a bit complicated initially- don't worry. It’s actually quite simple! 😎

In survey research, TURF is used to analyze questions where respondents select options they prefer from a set. It uses that data to uncover the combination of options that has the highest unduplicated reach.

Unduplicated being the keyword. 

Whether the options you’re testing are new products, features, or messaging- some options will likely appeal to similar audiences or even overlap with your existing offerings. The goal of TURF is to identify which options have the least overlap, so that the combination you select appeals to the largest number of people. 

 

Why is TURF Analysis Useful?

If you’re still a bit unclear on TURF's practical use cases in consumer research- let's take a look at an example. 

Say your company makes hand soap. You already have 5 high-selling scents, but you’re ready to expand your SKUs. So, your innovation team comes up with 15 new scents: 

No matter how great all of the new scents are, you know you can’t develop them all.  

Why? Because it would be incredibly time-consuming and cost-prohibitive to manufacture and ship each individual product. Not to mention the marketing and messaging lift. 

Looking at the logistics, you can feasibly move forward with 3 new scents out of the 15. 

So now, you’ve got to choose. 

You could just pick your favorites- but that wouldn’t be all that helpful. Realistically, you need to select the scents that will help you expand your customer base. 

So, you turn to research. 

Running a survey with your target market, you include a multi-select question presenting respondents with all of your current and proposed scents, asking them to select all they would consider purchasing.

Now, if you were to just look at purchase intent scores, you might find that Watermelon Mint, Orange Ginger, and Warm Vanilla Almond came out on top. 

But if you chose those scents, you’d be missing out on a big opportunity to expand your reach. 

Why? 

It turns out that people who preferred Warm Vanilla Almond also liked your Vanilla Bean scent. Cucumber Mint and Watermelon Mint were also preferred by the same respondents. And- you guessed it- the same goes for Citrus Burst and Orange Ginger. 

So instead of expanding your market, you would likely just cannibalize the sales of your most popular products- had you selected the three original winners. 

But a TURF analysis could tell you a very different story. 

While adding the Vanilla Bean, Watermelon Mint, and Orange Ginger scents to your current lineup would appeal to 75% of the consumers you surveyed, it turns out there is a better combination for optimal reach. 

In fact, by instead adding the Fig & Honey, Cedarwood & Frankincense, and Coconut scents to your inventory your appeal score rises to 94%- greatly expanding the reach of your hand soap portfolio. 

When Can I Use a TURF Analysis? 

When it comes to applying TURF analysis to your research, the possibilities are (nearly) endless. 

For marketers, TURF analysis will give you insights into the combination of message points that will appeal to the greatest number of people. Similarly, you can use it to understand which channels would work best for reaching new or larger audiences. 

In product development, TURF analysis enables you to pick the perfect mix of product features that will attract the most potential customers. 

And if you’re a consumer goods brand that deals with product flavors, colors, or other variations-  TURF analysis can help you understand the market appeal to expect when launching something new. It will also tell you whether your newest product will encroach on the market of any of your existing offerings. 

 

Automated TURF Analysis with SightX

We’ve made TURF analysis more intuitive than ever before with our latest feature drop!

Whether you're testing new products, features, or messaging- it's now easier than ever to experiment with different scenarios and identify a winning combination to expand your reach. 

After you’ve run a survey, you can head over to the TURF analysis section of SightX and choose one of the multi-select questions you included in your project. The applicable questions will auto-populate in the dropdown menu that appears: 

 

 

Next, you can use the Optimal Combination Simulator to choose the number of options you’d like to include in your combination. If you're not quite settled on a number yet, you can see the unduplicated reach for each number of options to help you better decide. 

Below, you can see that the jump in reach between 4 options and 5 is quite large (21%) compared to the difference between 5 and 6 (1%). This will help you quickly evaluate the reach associated with each number of options.

 

 

For this example, let’s say we’ve chosen 5 options. 

From there, the Optimal Combination Simulator will give you a breakdown of the five top combinations and their reach. In the example below, you can see that the top combinations for our data would be combination 1 or combination 2. Meaning we could select either.

 

 

Now, for situations like our first use case, where we are testing the reach of both our current AND new scents- we’ll want to handle things a little differently.  

When looking at the optimal combinations, we’ll want to use the dropdown on the right-hand side and select “always include” for our 5 current scents. This will ensure that each combination shown will always have Vanilla Bean, Spiced Pear, Cucumber Mint, Eucalyptus, and Citrus Burst incorporated. 

And, if for some reason after running our study, we decide that one of the new scents is just too difficult or expensive to manufacture, we can hit “always exclude” next to that option to remove it from contention.

 

 

Getting Started with TURF Analysis

If you’re ready to level up your insights, we’ve got the tools to make it happen! 

The SightX platform is the next generation of market research tools: a single unified solution for consumer engagement, understanding, advanced analysis, and reporting.

With the new addition of our TURF Analysis Simulator we have made it easier than ever to get insights on the products, features, and message points that will expand your reach. 

Whether you are ready for a total DIY experience or prefer a little more support and guidance- we’ve got you covered. Start a free trial today!

 

From differences across platforms, formats, and audiences- creating ads that deliver ROI is no easy feat. 

With all of the effort that goes into developing copy, layouts, and design, wouldn't it be nice to know you're on the right track before you hit "publish"?

That's exactly why many brands use ad testing to screen and perfect their advertising concepts prior to a campaign launch.  

 

What is Ad Testing? 

Ad testing is simply the process of vetting your ad concepts with a sample of your target audience. The process is quite flexible and can be adapted to test any aspect of your ads or campaigns. For example, you can run ad testing on fully formed ads, ads still in the storyboard stage, an entire ad, or just specific aspects of an ad. 

With ad testing, you can find out how memorable and engaging your advertisements are, how strong the call to action is, and whether they resonate well with your target audience. 

 

Why is Ad Testing Important?

Consumers are constantly bombarded with advertisements from an endless string of brands competing for their attention. Whether it’s commercials on streaming services, paid results on google searches, or branded content on social media; advertisements are everywhere.

And with all of that noise, sometimes it can be tempting to take a risk. Try something a bit outside of the box in an attempt to stand out. 

But, without testing that risk grows exponentially larger. 

Don't believe us? Just take a look at some of the ads below. Each was likely thought of as "catchy", "clever", or "attention-grabbing" internally...

 

Need we say more? 

Even if you steer clear of risky concepts and language, that doesn't mean you shouldn't test your ads. 

No matter your strategy, ad testing allows you to see past your blind spots and get direct feedback from those that matter most: your target market.

 

Tools for Ad Testing 

 

Concept Testing 

Concept testing is a great do-it-all tool for ad testing. You can use it to evaluate your copy, graphics, formatting, placement, or any combination of these. While many just consider concept testing useful for comparing ideas and selecting a winner, it's so much more than that! You can use the insights to take your winning concept from good to great!

 

Heat Mapping

Heat maps are a fantastic exercise in visual storytelling. While it technically can be used to test a variety of assets, you'll find using it on graphics to be especially helpful. It works by organizing data about an image using color-coded zones to represent the frequency of activities, interactions, and sentiments. This leaves you with key insights into the ads that garner the most frequent and positive interactions. 

 

Text Highlighter 

If you're specifically interested in perfecting the text-based aspects of your advertisements, look no further! Our text highlighter question gives you targeted insights on your copy quickly and effectively. It does this by having respondents highlight specific sections of your text to rate how interesting, clear, engaging, or good/bad it is. With a wide variety of rating scales to choose from, you can customize your test to get the exact feedback you need to perfect your copy!

 

Automated MaxDiff Analysis 

This one might sound complicated, but it's actually quite simple! MaxDiff analysis allows respondents to rate the importance of different aspects of your product, service, or brand as a whole. This gives you clear data on the features that matter most to consumers, allowing you to center your messaging on them. 

 

 

How to Test Your Ads More Effectively

To get actionable insights from your ad testing, you’ll need a well-designed experiment. Starting with a concept test, you can focus on a few key areas like: 

How well respondents retained the product and brand info in your ad. 

The uniqueness, relevancy, and believability of the ad messaging.

Respondents' likelihood to purchase from your brand based on the ad they viewed.

And to dig a bit deeper, you can add heatmaps to your concept test.

Using heatmaps, you can get visualized feedback on the aspects that catch respondents’ attention, whether that attention is positive or negative, and understand what elements (if any) would drive them to engage with your Call to Action (CTA).

Here's an example of the output from our own ad testing: 

 

 

If you're ready to start testing your ads, click the button below for our free template: 

 

 

 

 

Ad Testing Best Practices

What’s the biggest mistake an advertiser can make?

Making too many assumptions.

Just because you’ve always used a certain brand voice, copywriting style, or ad layout, doesn’t mean it is your best option.

Ad testing is the perfect time to think outside the box and explore your copy and creative options.

Maybe your usual style comes off as overly “salesy” for a large segment of your target market. Or, perhaps the language you use to describe your product or service is not the same natural language your customers would use.

Conversely, just because you assume your latest idea is funny or clever,  doesn't mean it actually is. So it's best to run it by your target market to confirm - or deny- your hypothesis. 

And when it comes to the study itself, make sure to keep your survey short, direct, and to the point. All of the questions you ask should point back to the main goals you want to accomplish. That will help to keep the survey brief and your insights poignant. 

Thankfully, our template does most of the heavy lifting for you 😉

 

Ad Testing with SightX

The SightX platform is the next generation of consumer research tools: a single, unified solution for consumer engagement, understanding, advanced analysis, and reporting. Allowing you to take the guesswork out of your decision-making.

But, SightX isn’t just great tech. All of our survey templates are expertly crafted by our team of research and insights pros, who know the tips, tricks, and best practices to get the best data from your surveys.

If you're ready to take your advertising to the next level, start your free trial today!

 

We've said it before, and we'll say it again: Concept testing is one of the most versatile tools in your insights toolbox.

Whether you are in product development, marketing, branding, or customer experience- concept testing is invaluable for eliciting direct feedback from your target market. 

And the data won't just save you from making costly mistakes- like launching a poorly designed product or publishing a confusing ad. The insights you gain from concept testing can actually help you further develop, perfect, and iterate on your ideas.  

But before we dive into the nitty-gritty, let's define a few terms we'll be using:

Concepts- Simply put, these are the ideas you will be testing. Concepts can come in many forms, from logos and ad creative to product prototypes and messaging. 

Concept Test- This is the experiment you use to test the concepts you have developed. Think of a concept test as a bucket and the concepts as the items that go into it. 

 

Why Concept Testing is Crucial 

Concept testing plays a major role in the trajectory of a new idea, providing critical insights and minimizing potential risks.

While your team might think their latest idea is genius, the opinions of your target market are the only opinions that really matter. And if that target market doesn't see the value in your idea during testing, they definitely won’t see the value once it’s released.

By concept testing your ideas first, you can better understand consumers' likes and dislikes and adjust course accordingly, repeating the process until you hone in on the best possible version of your concept. While this process can extend development timelines, it also eliminates the time you would have wasted chasing the production of a poor idea.

Because most concept tests can be done via online surveys there is a high degree of flexibility. This means you can easily gather feedback on many facets of your idea, allowing you to perfect every last detail before launch.

 

Our Top 7 Tips for a Better Concept Test

A good concept test is one that gives you precise feedback from your target market. By taking the time to thoughtfully design your experiment, you're more likely to get reliable data and usable insights.

To help you do just that, we've put together our best tips:

1. Establish goals early on in the research process. 

While it might be tempting to load up your concept test with any and every question you've thought up, you should instead focus on the key insights you want to gain.

Gather your team and any other colleagues that may have a use for the data and ask yourselves some basic questions: What kind of responses would be most useful? How will we use the data once we have it? What metrics matter most to us? 

Nailing down these details early in your concept testing process will ensure the data you collect translates to impactful insights.  

 

2. Pick the right methodology for your needs. 

Next up, you’ll need to pick a methodology that best aligns with your goals and project parameters. Two of the most commonly used are monadic and sequential monadic testing.

With a monadic design, the pool of respondents is split into groups, one for each concept. Each group is shown a single concept and asked a series of follow-up questions. Once the data is collected from all groups, you can compare the results and choose a winner.

Because each respondent is only shown a single concept, this design allows you to ask more in-depth follow-up questions while keeping the overall experiment short. This keeps things simple for respondents and eliminates potential interaction effects or bias.

However, there are some drawbacks.

Monadic testing requires a larger sample size, which can drive up the cost and time to insights.

That being said, we would suggest a monadic design if:

You only have a few concepts you would like to test.
You have the budget to capture feedback from a larger sample.
You require detailed feedback on each of your concepts.

On the other hand, sequential monadic testing exposes respondents to two or more concepts in a single test. Each concept is presented in random order and followed by a short set of questions. After the data is collected- you can compare the concepts within a single test to find your winner.

Sequential monadic design is often the more efficient choice.

Because each respondent evaluates multiple concepts, you can use a smaller sample- reducing both the cost and lead time. Similarly, having respondents compare and rank your concepts can give you a deeper understanding of your audiences’ true preferences. 

Additionally, if you want to use significance testing in your analysis- a sequential monadic design is optimal. This will allow you to compare the scores between concepts within the same test, helping you to quickly spot meaningful insights in your data. 

But of course, there are some disadvantages.

Sequential monadic testing greatly limits the number of follow-up questions you can ask about each concept. And even if you curb the number of follow-up questions you include, testing multiple concepts can lead to respondent fatigue, jeopardizing your data quality. 

With all that in mind, we would suggest using a sequential monadic design if:

There are several concepts you need to test- usually, this is the case during early rounds of testing when you need to screen a batch of ideas without a large panel.
You are limited by your schedule or budget.
There are only a few questions you need to ask about each concept.
You want to use significance testing to compare concept scores.

 

3. Give respondents some context. 

No matter what type of concepts you're testing, it’s important for respondents to have a clear idea of what they are evaluating. 

You can use any combination of text, images, or videos to give them clarity on what your concepts are exactly and what their purpose is. 

If you are testing a product concept, describe the problems your product solves and why it’s better than other solutions on the market. Or, if you are screening ad concepts, explain where these ads will be placed- are they digital banner ads? Or will it be featured in a print magazine? 

And make sure to avoid technical jargon or buzzwords. While it may make perfect sense to you and your team, it's likely to confuse your respondents.

 

4. Ask the right questions. 

You’d be forgiven if the first question you ask is: Do you like this concept? But that shouldn’t be where you stop.

Of course, you’ll want to investigate the classics- like which elements respondents liked and disliked. But take the time to circle back to the goals and objectives you previously outlined to be sure that each key metric is evaluated.

If you want to know how appealing each of your ad concepts are and how they impact a consumer's purchase intent, you will need to include some questions on both.

If you are looking to understand the associations that your product concept invokes, you might consider using an open-ended question. You can analyze the data with Natural Language Processing (NLP) for insights on common themes, topics, keywords, and sentiments.

 

5. Avoid hidden triggers of bias.

While we all know bias is detrimental to data quality, you might be surprised to learn some of the triggers.

One major trigger of bias comes from scale questions, specifically cases where you force neutral respondents to make choices that don't accurately reflect their feelings.

When using rating or Likert scale questions, you should always opt for a 5- or 7-point scale. This allows you to add a neutral option so that those who are indifferent or unsure can give authentic feedback.

Similarly, the way you word your questions and order the answer options can also trigger bias.

Make sure to use neutral language when writing your questions. And for your answer options, opt for randomization whenever possible. You could also consider adding a free-response option to your multiple-choice questions to capture any alternatives you might have missed.

 

6. Get creative with heatmaps. 

Heatmaps are an excellent tool for visualizing concept testing data. By adding them to your concept tests, you can get granular feedback on the specific areas that respondents liked and what wasn’t quite working for them.

Whether you are testing packaging, advertising, prototype, or shelf-placement concepts- you can't go wrong with heatmaps. 

And while images may be an obvious use case, heatmaps also work well for copy. They allow you to see which areas were the most engaging to the reader and which may need a few more rounds of editing.

 

7. Use automated significance testing to pick out meaningful insights. 

Sometimes concept tests won’t give you a clear-cut winner.

Let’s say you ran a concept test for your upcoming ad campaign. After exposing respondents to both ads, you asked them how likely they were to purchase your product.

But once the data came in, you found that 64% were likely to buy your product after viewing the first ad, while 72% said the same thing after seeing the second.

So you find yourself wondering, is that 8% meaningful? That's precisely why significance testing is so important. 

No matter what your key metrics may be- from appeal to purchase intent scores- significance testing gives you a way to quickly and easily understand whether the slight differences in your data are in fact meaningful. 

 

Concept Testing with SightX

The SightX platform is the next generation of market research tools: a single, unified solution for consumer engagement, understanding, advanced analysis, and reporting. It allows insights, marketing, and CX teams to start, optimize, and scale their insights workflow.

But, SightX isn’t just great tech our Research Services team knows all of the best practices, along with some tips and tricks for getting the best data out of your surveys.

Remove the guesswork from your current strategy by going directly to the source.

If you're ready to put your ideas to the test, start a free trial today!